Rebecca Walker

PhD PhilosophyMA PhilosophyAB American Studies

Dr. Walker’s work is largely in research ethics including animal research, phase I healthy volunteer research, and genomic advances. She also works on topics in health care ethics including distributive justice and concepts of autonomy. Dr. Walker completed a Greenwall Foundation post-doctoral fellowship in bioethics and health policy at Johns Hopkins and Georgetown Universities in July 2001. She then held a visiting faculty position in the Philosophy Department at the University of Michigan, arriving at UNC in 2003. In Philosophy, she regularly teaches topics in ethics and bioethics at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. In Social Medicine she teaches three courses during the “foundational” phase of the medical school curriculum. Dr. Walker serves on the UNC Hospital Ethics Service and the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee. She is a co-investigator in the Center for Genomics and Society (Gail Henderson, PI) as well as in the HealthyVOICES project (Jill Fisher, PI), a longitudinal study of phase I clinical trial volunteers. Dr. Walker is also part of the research ethics faculty resource for UNC’s Clinical and Translational Science Award. She is a fellow in the Parr Center for Ethics at UNC.